[Katie Reynolds]

The new rule puts a whole new twist on strategy. Before, it was generally, "try to get a score close to your opponent's during the qualification rounds, and pound your opponent into the ground during the elims." Now, teams need to use the same basic strategy during the qualification matches as well as the elimination matches. It also prevents teams from building strictly "elimination round" robots - robots that score low during the qualifying rounds because they completely dominate the field and can kick the snot out of almost anyone who goes against them.

I do think there should have been more emphasis placed on this new rule at the start of the season, however I don't think there should be any changes made now. The rules were there for all teams to read during the build - anyone could have read them and looked at them. Because some teams did not see the new twist on a rule, is not grounds enough for FIRST to change the way things are run. Changing the rules now would be especially unfair to those teams that have already competed.

- Katie